Stand firm in your faith, or you will not stand at all
Exposing the threats to Confessional Lutheranism

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

God Hates Sin but Loves the Sinner?

You’ve probably heard the phrase “God hates the sin
but loves the sinner” in the past. It’s
a phrase that’s a little dated. There’s
not a whole lot of talk about sin or
the sinner any more. Emerging Church
leader Rob Bell’s book Love Wins is a
good example, where his comment on the orthodox Christian doctrine of heaven
and hell is that it’s “misguided and toxic and ultimately subverts the
contagious spread of Jesus’s message of love, peace, forgiveness, and joy that
our world desperately needs to hear."
Yes, the world, and specifically sinners, don’t want to hear that they’re
sinners. And they certainly don’t want
to hear that God hates sinners, but
that’s precisely what they need to hear.

A few years back one of the retired pastors in our
congregation gave me a copy of the following paper, written by Dr. Walter W. F.
Albrecht in 1953, titled “Does God Hate Sin or the Sinner?” Dr. Albrecht does a great job of explaining
that God does hate the sinner, and
why it is important that that message be preached, followed by the Gospel
message that Christ died to save sinners.
Here is Dr. Albrecht’s paper in its entirety. I hope you’ll give it a
read, especially if you’re a pastor. You
can download a copy here.

“If
it is true that God hates the sinner, how is this truth to be presented in
sermons without doing harm?”

Springfield
Circuit Conference

April
20, 1953

The
wording of the question casts doubt on a divine truth and assumes that harm can
be done by preaching the truth. While
unworthy of a Christian, it no doubt proceeds from a troubled heart. Let’s answer it therefore, and divide it into
the two questions: Does Scripture teach that God hates the sinner? and How is
this truth to be preached?

I.

DOES
SCRIPTURE TEACH THAT GOD HATES THE SINNER?

Hatred the
dictionary defines as “bitter dislike or aversion; antipathy; animosity;
enmity.” It “implies extreme aversion,
especially as coupled with enmity or malice.”
Dislike is repugnance. Aversion
is mental opposition. Antipathy is an
instinctive feeling of aversion or dislike.
Animosity is active and vehement enmity; ill will. Enmity is hostility or the state of being an
enemy. Synonyms of hatred are: “Abhorrence,
anger, animosity, antipathy, aversion, detestation, dislike, enmity, grudge,
hate, hostility, ill will, malevolence, malice, rancor, repugnance, resentment,
revenge, spite.” When speaking of God as
hating, we of course do not imply “malevolence, malice, malignity, rancor,
revenge, spite,” and the like. That
would be charging Him with evil. We do
not mean to say that His hatred is “coupled with malice.” When the dictionary defines, “Hate or hatred,
as applied to persons, as intense and continued aversion, usually with
disposition to injure,” this “usually with disposition to injure” does not fit
God. “Anger is sudden and brief, hatred
is lingering and enduring,” continues the dictionary.

Now
our question reads: Does God have a bitter dislike and strong aversion for the
sinner? Is He the enemy of the
sinner? Has He an enduring antipathy
against sinners? Does He detest sinners?

Looking
into Scripture, we find these statements: “Thou art not a God that hath
pleasure in wickedness…. Thou hatest
(sane) all workers of iniquity. Thou
shalt destroy them that speak leasing (lies): the Lord will abhor the bloody
and deceitful man,” Ps. 5:5-6. “These
six things does the Lord hate (sane): a
false witness that speaketh lies,” Prov. 6:16, 19. “I will destroy your high places, and cut
down your images, and cast your carcasses upon the carcasses of your idols, and
my soul shall abhor you,” Lev. 26:30.
Moses, pleading for idolatrous Israel, declares: “I was afraid of the
anger and hot displeasure, wherewith the Lord was wroth against you to destroy
you,” Deut. 9:19. David, in Ps. 78:59,
reminds the children of Israel of his day: “When God heard this (idolatry), He was
wroth, and greatly abhorred Israel.” And
in Ps. 89:38: “Thou hast cast off and abhorred, Thou hast been wroth with Thine
anointed.” Prov. 22:14: “The mouth of
strange women is a deep pit: he that is abhorred of the Lord shall fall
therein.”

And
in turning to the New Testament, we find John the Baptist preaching: “O
generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?”
Matthew 3:7. Christ prophesies of the last days of Jerusalem and the world:
“For there shall be great distress in the land, and wrath upon this people,”
Luke 21:23. In the presence of the
centurion of Capernaum Jesus prophesied: “But the children of the kingdom shall
be cast out into outer darkness,” Matt. 8:12.
“And when the Son of Man shall come in His glory and all nations be
gathered before Him, then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, ‘Depart
from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his
angels,’” Matt. 25:41.

In
Rom. 1:30 the RV has correctly changed the translation from “haters of God” to
“hateful to God,” for that is what theostugēs means. And when Paul in Rom 5:10 says, “For if, when
we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more,
being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life,” the words “when we were
enemies,” echthroi ontes, express not our enmity for God, but God’s
enmity toward us. Eph. 2:3 Paul says:
“And were by nature the children of wrath.”
As we came into the world, before ever we had committed a sin in
desires, thoughts, words, and deeds, were we hated, detested, abhorred by
God. In 2 Cor. 16:22 Paul pronounces the
curse of God on all who reject Christ: “If any man love not the Lord Jesus
Christ, let him be Anathema Maran-atha.”

But
this is also Paul’s sentiment. He hates
the despiser of Christ. Even as he says
in Rom. 11:28 of the Jews: “As concerning the Gospel, they are enemies
for your sakes; but as touching the election, they are beloved for your
fathers’ sakes.” And so David echoes the
feelings of his divine Lord, when he says, Ps. 139:21-22: “Do not I hate them,
O Lord, that hate Thee? And am I not
grieved with those that rise up against Thee?
I hate them with perfect hatred; I count them mine enemies.”

That
Luther’s translation of Ps. 101:3 (“Ich hasse den Uebertreter und lasse ihn
nicht bei mir bleiben”) is better than the Authorized “I hate the work of them
that turn aside,” is evident from the context even in the Authorized: “A
froward heart shall depart from me: I will not know a wicked person…. He that worketh deceit shall not dwell within
my house: he that telleth lies shall not tarry in my sight. I will early destroy all the wicked of the
land; that I may cut off all wicked doers from the city of the Lord.” The Latin renders it: “Facientes
praevaricationes odivi.” The Greek: poiountes
parabaseis emisēsa. Everyone is
familiar with the imprecatory Psalms of David, 59, 69, 109, where he calls down
the wrath of God upon his enemies.

Is
this Missouri teaching? Dr. F. Pieper
says, Dogm. II, 345: “Rom 5:10: All men are echthroi, hated by God,
under His wrath.” And in a footnote he
quotes Luthardt as saying: “echthroi ontes does not have the active
sense (as, e.g., Beck and Ritschl hold), but the passive sense: whose enemy God
was, who lay under God’s wrath.”

Vol.
II, p. 346 Piper says: “Rom. 5:10 ‘When we were enemies (echthroi,
passive: Deo invisi), we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son.’ Luthardt: ‘A change of attitude onthepartofGod is meant.’”

Again,
Vol. II, 348: “The katalassein (reconcile) of Rom. 5:10 and 2 Cor. 5:14
does not refer – let the fact be noted – to any change that occurs in men, but
describes an occurrence in the heart of God.
It was God who laid His anger by on account of the ransom brought by
Christ.” And in a footnote Pieper quotes
Meyer, who says: “Mankind was on account of its uncancelled sins under God’s
holy wrath, echthroi Theou, Rom. 5:10, Deo invisi, the object of God’s
hatred; but with the cancellation of their sins, effected by the death of
Christ, God’s wrath came to an end. The
reconciliation of all mankind took place objectively through the death of
Christ.”

Again,
Vol. II, 352: “They object that it is a disparagement of the Divine Being to
predicate of Him anger, wrath, enmity, as if nothing less than Christ’s
substitutional suffering and death could reconcile Him to man. (Footnote: This criticism is advanced not
only by the Socinians, the coarse rationalists, Ritschl, etc., but also by many
contemporaneous sectarian preachers. The
soft generation of our day must be spared the stern preaching of the wrath of
God against sinful mankind.)

Only
Scripture can tell us what conceptions of God are worthy or unworthy of Him,
and Scripture tells us that according to His righteousness God is very angry
with sinful men. Rom. 1:18: “The wrath
of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of
men.” Gal. 3:10: “Cursed is everyone
that continueth not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law to
do them.” Rom. 5:10: ‘When we were
enemies,’ echthroi ontes. This
testimony of Scripture is corroborated by the voice of conscience, which finds
no surcease in the philosophical speculations about the impossibility,
unreasonableness, etc., of God’s wrath. – But the wrath of god struck Christ in
our stead, and, expending itself on Him, it is changed into grace. Gal. 3:13: ‘Christ has redeemed us from the
curse of the Law, being made a curse for us.’”
(Footnote: Mayer on Rom. 5:10 (echtroi): “It is not to be taken in the
active sense – we were God’s enemies – for the death of Christ did not wipe out
the enmity of men against God, such against whom the holy orgē of God
was directed on account of sin: theostugeis (hated by God), Rom. 1:30;
children of wrath, Eph. 2:3.”)

Pieper
II, 353: “According to Scripture, Christ’s death reveals both God’s love and God’s
wrath. This truth is brought out in this
very passage, Rom. 5:8-11. ‘Hated by God
(Deo invisi, lying under God’s wrath), we were reconciled to God.’” Footnote: “This is Meyer’s correct
explanation of this passage. Also
Luthardt: “With whom God was angry, who were under the orgē of God – in
spite of the agapē – katēlagēmen – katalagentes,
passive. “Den Zorn laesst er wohl
fahren” (“But lays His anger by”).”
Pieper II, 406f: “We were reconciled with God while we were still
objects of His wrath (“when we were enemies” v. 10, God being our enemy).”

Dr.
G. Stoeckhardt comments on Rom 5:10: “In our passage, too, it is brought out
that this blessing of Christ began during the opposing state of mankind. While we were yet enemies, whilewehadGodagainstus, without this inimical relation
being reduced or mitigated in any way, this great, wonderful change occurred,
God’s Son took our place, shouldered the wrath and enmity, suffered the wrath
in His passion and death, and thus converted our hostile relation to God into a
relation of friendship, and procured for us God’s favor and affection.” p. 229.

On
Rom. 1:30, theostugeis, Stoeckhardt remarks: “Such arrogance (over against the
fellowman) is an especial abomination to God.
Therefore the Apostle inserts the thought here that people of this
caliber are hated of God. For
theostugeis, which has only the passive meaning (hated) and cannot mean osoresDei (haters of God), does not fit for an independent place in this list
of sins and must therefore be combined with the expressions following as their
attribute.” p. 66.

Stoeckhardt
in his Commentary on Romans shows that Paul in Rom. 5:6-9 sets forth the
unspeakably great love which God has shown us, namely, that Christ died for
us. For whom did He die? “Christ died for the ungodly,” v. 6. Not for the righteous, not for the good
people, v. 7. He died for “us while we
were yet sinners,” v. 8. Through
Christ’s death and blood we, all men, are justified, v. 9. And if we have been justified, “we shall be saved
from wrath (RV: the wrath of God) through Him,” v. 9.

If
the greater thing has come to pass, the lesser will “much more” take
place. The change which made justified
people of the ungodly is greater than the change in the translation of the
righteous into eternal bliss. Through
Christ we shall escape the wrath of the Last Day. This conclusion Paul repeats in v. 10, the
verse we are interested in. Here the
Apostle says: If we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son while we
were enemies, not righteous men, not good men, but ungodly, sinners, people
whom God abhorred, much more will the living and exalted Christ save us into
His life, eternal life.

Of echthroi
Stoeckhardt says (p. 288): “Baur, Beck, Ritschl take echthroi in the active
sense of haters of God, and katēlagēmen, katalagentes
(reconciled) in the subjective sense of a change of attitude in man
brought about through Christ’s death, through God’s love, an amicable
disposition of man toward God, ‘But this interpretation,’ Weiss correctly
notes, ‘would contradict the whole context, which does not speak of a change of
mind toward God on the part of man, but speaks (of God’s act) of justification
and its consequences, and this opinion would supply an entirely different
motive for the “much more” in v. 10 than in v. 9, where the conclusion as to
what favor can be expected in the future rests not on a greater worthiness of
man, but on a greater evidence of God’s love.’” p. 228.

Of
Eph. 2:3 Stoeckhardt says: “All men are by nature and birth, before they have
committed any sin, subject to God’s wrath.
Paul clearly and definitely teaches, just as the other writers of Holy
Writ, that original sin is peccatumveredamnans…. Even though our reason hesitates and refuses
to acknowledge that this original ruin is truly sin which includes guilt and
thus subjects to the wrath of God, nevertheless we also in this case simply
follow the teaching of Scripture which describes and pictures man as he is by
nature, after the Fall, as a perfectly corrupt and detestable creature,
the child of disobedience, of death, or wrath, and of eternal damnation, and in
this way present in a much brighter light the mercy of God toward this fallen
man.” Commentary on Ephesians, Sommer
Translation, p. 123.

Dr.
Th. Engelder says in ScriptureCannotBeBroken, p.
240: “The offense which men take at the
so-called imprecatory psalms is due to two defects in their moral sense. They are, in the first place, deficient in the sense of the
enormity and hatefulness of sin, of the rebellion against God, of false
doctrine. They refuse to let God’s wrath
against the evil-doer make its full impression on their ethico-Christian
consciousness…. And, secondly, their
moral sense lacks too much of the fear of God.
They dare to lay down rules of behavior for the almighty, all holy
God. They tell us that it would be
unseemly if God had inspired the imprecatory psalms…. Because we believe in Verbal Inspiration, we
know that those sentiments express the mind of God; and while some of the
expressions may seem too harsh to us, we bridle our thoughts. We know that, while now we see only through a
glass darkly, the light of glory will reveal to us that every word of the
imprecatory psalms is in full accord with the eternal Holiness.”

Prof.
H. Hamann of Australia quotes from McClintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia, VIII, p.
755: “The truth is that only a morbid benevolence, a mistaken philanthropy,
takes offense at these psalms; for in reality they are not opposed to the
spirit of the Gospel nor to that love of enemies which Christ enjoined. Resentment against evil-doers is so far from
sinful, that we find it exemplified in the meek and spotless Redeemer Himself,
Mark 3:5.” Quoted by Engelder p. 240.

Who
is it that teaches that there is no wrath and hatred of the sinner in God? Abelard (d. 1142) taught that the Son of God
came into the world not to satisfy the justice of God, but to give us, by His
teaching and example, particularly by His death, the supreme proof of God’s
love and thus to awaken in us love for God, and that by exercising this love
for God we are reconciled and justified.
To say that God was reconciled by the blood of the innocent Christ would
be “cruel and unjust.” The Socinians and
Unitarians hold a similar view. Ritschl,
Ad. Harnack, von Hofmann also teach it.
Ritschl’s “declaratory theory” teaches that there is no wrath in God on
account of sin, but that God declares His love for man through Christ. The purpose of Christ’s life and suffering
was not to render vicarious satisfaction to God’s justice, but to convince men
that they need not fear God because of their sins. Once men are convinced of this, their
reconciliation is accomplished. The
sense of guilt is an illusion which it is the part of Christ to dispel. This leaves as essence of Christianity human
morality induced by Christ’s preaching.

This
Rischlian idea of a God without wrath who is all love has permeated not only
sectarian circles here in the United States.
In the Lutheran Standard of the ALC of Feb. 21, 1953 we are told that
the imprecatory psalms are “out of line with the spirit of Christ.” We quote: “The believers of the Old Testament
had only a limited revelation of God…. This also made for a limited morality, both in
terms of knowledge and of motivation….
Further, it is often characteristic of the Old Testament to identify
evil with the person who committed it.
In the New Testament a sharp distinction is made between sin and the
sinner. The New Testament, too, hates
and damns sin. But it distinguishes it
from the sinner, and it loves and seeks to redeem that sinner”…. To us, children of the New Testament, they
(those imprecatory prayers) must remain foreign in spirit. Here Jesus is our pattern.” What a lack of Christian knowledge!

It
is evident, then, that Scripture teaches a hatred of God not only for sin, but
for the sinner.

II.

HOW
SHOULD THIS TRUTH BE PREACHED?

A) Since it is a Scripture truth, it istobepreached. We are to
teach men all things whatsoever Christ has commanded. We are to instruct men in the whole counsel
of God. Whoever subtracts from what God
has revealed in Scripture is as guilty as the teacher who adds to God’s
Word. To His warning, “Therefore be ye
also ready,” in His description of the last times the Lord immediately adds the
question: “who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath made
ruler over his household, to give them meat in due season?” Matthew 25:45.

B) This truth of God’s hate for the transgressor
is to be preached clearly. Our
preaching of this truth must fit the declaration of God: “The Word of God is quick and powerful, and
sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul
and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts
and intents of the heart,” Heb. 4:12.
But, you counter, it denies the love of God. It does.
And it should. Remember, Law and
Gospel are plusquamcontradictoria, more than contradictory. God’s hatred, wrath, curse of the sinner is
Law. Its purpose is to arouse in the sinner
a lively consciousness of his doom. The
conviction that God is his enemy, is after him, is wroth beyond description or
comprehension, will visit upon him his every iniquity, will punish even man’s
corrupt condition which he did not himself produce, with excruciating pains of
body and soul forevermore, - this conviction must seize man until he
trembles in terrors of conscience and in self-despair cries out: “Men and
Brethren, what shall we do?” Acts 2:37.

If
we do not so preach the divine Law, if we dull its cutting edge, its
penetrating point, by mixing in here the love of God, we are unfaithful
shepherds, burying our pound in the ground and gaining nothing for Christ. As long as man stands in the shadow of the Law
- as every one does by nature – and remains ignorant of God’s true relation to
him as the Giver of that Law, he will refuse to step into the sunlight of the
Gospel, he will not learn how to blot out the handwriting of condemnation in
his conscience with the handwriting of justification by the blood of the
Crucified One, he will not discover how properly to separate Law and Gospel,
but will inevitably combine Law and Gospel and make of God a shrew, and idol,
who scolds a lot, but means little of it, who executes little of what He
threatens, but is swayed by a sickly sentimentality. But such a belief is no saving faith; it is a
man-made faith without power to save. Brethren,
let your preaching of the Law be sharp and clear.

C)
The truth of God’s consuming hatred of the sinner should be preached boldly. Will it do harm? What a question for a Christian teacher to
ask! God’s truth can do no harm. “My Word shall accomplish that which I
please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it,” Is. 55:11. But will it not frighten people away from the
Church? You are indeed commissioned to
preach the Gospel to all the world. But
where does God promise that you will convert all the world? On the contrary, Scripture teaches that only
God’s elect will be saved. Even among
the believers there are casualties. Some
are time-believers. And if any man comes
to faith and remains in faith unto the end, it is God’s doing. We contribute nothing to it. We can only wreck God’s plan of saving by
shortchanging people in handing out Law or Gospel. But if we are faithful to God’s instructions,
if we boldly teach Law and Gospel in their purity, His divine ends will be
fully accomplished an all His elect will be saved. We are not called to build up a mighty visible
organization, to work for a united impressive front, but to build the invisible
kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ according to His specifications.

D)
The preaching of God’s hate of the sinner must be followed by the
preaching of God’s love for the same sinner. (See Piper II, 352). In other words, the preaching of the Law must
be succeeded by the preaching of the Gospel.
Our Great Commission and chief office is the preaching of the
Gospel. We preach the Law only propterevangelium. The Law is to serve
the Gospel. And the Law is to be
overcome by the Gospel. “Christ is the
end of the Law for righteousness to everyone that believeth,” Rom. 10:4. Luther: “Both are God’s Word, the Law and the
Gospel, but the two are not equal. One
is lower, the other higher; one is weaker, the other stronger; one is lesser,
the other greater. When now they wrestle
with each other, I follow the Gospel and say, Good-by, Law!” Pieper: “It is therefore a part of the proper
distinction between Law and Gospel that the Gospel be recognized as the “higher
Word,” which is to be God’s final Word for the terrified sinner.” III,
232. As Paul says: “Moreover the Law
entered, that the offence might abound.
But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: that as sin hath
reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto
eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord,” Rom. 5:20-21.

3 comments:

Thanks Scott. Don't know how you find these gems, but I'm sure glad you do. Now, can you find me the sermon by Luther on Leviticus 19 referenced by President Harrison in his address at CTSFW? Imagine, Luther thundering on Leviticus - that should awaken me in the morning.Pax,Dennis